Switched, Bothered and Bewildered (29 page)

nerves for a month! She'd never even asked him! Instead she'd guilted out her sister and made her impersonate her at work. Jackson shook his head in disbelief at the crazy scheme they'd cooked up.

Jackson thought about the mind of Jillian Tompkins and how she could have convinced herself that taking a break from the stress of her job would have meant the end of her career. And most of all that her career meant that much to her.

Was he like that? Maybe it was time to put something besides his job first. One thing was for sure, he wasn't letting Jana Lee Tompkins Stivers out of his sight.

ItMusfBeJilly
'Cause Jan Don't
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Lifce. That

Dean made omelets for their lunch with tomatoes and spinach and all sorts of green stuff he'd made her go pick with him in his garden. He'd mumbled about needing to weed and thank God he had an automatic sprinkler system, because they'd had no decent rain and this was the driest June he could remember.

It was a beautiful garden, with Dean's metal sculptures sprouting all over the place. They were beanpoles, garden gates, and benches. But most beautiful of all were the huge bronze pieces. Women with smooth bodies curled up like sleeping cats, or sitting serenely on rocks. Jillian loved them.

She and Dean had lolled in the sunshine, eating his strawberries, talking about his work. She'd

been feeling very off-center all afternoon, but the relaxed meal and relaxed surroundings had helped her forget about it.

They'd brought Monty with them, and he'd been loping around after her like a puppy dog, looking worried. Maybe he wasn't too keen on new places.

Inside, her bare feet felt good on the dark wood floors, and Monty's nails made a click, click beside her.

The floors were so smooth you could hardly see the joint lines. She followed Dean as he showed her some of his fine art showcased nicely on the putty green walls of the hallways. There were smokey landscapes of a very modern nature, and some pure abstract pieces. She knew he was an artist, but the whole house and its contents still amazed her. It was sleek and minimalist, but it still had warmth. Black, putty green, soft ochre yellow, and a wonderful, deep terra-cotta plastered effect on some walls reminded her of pictures she'd seen of Italian houses.

"Your place is beautiful, Dean."

"Thanks. I designed it myself, and my crew helped me build it." Dean gave Monty a scratch behind the ears.

"Carly should be in San Francisco by now. That was the dumbest flight, with a stop in Portland, but last-minute beggars can't be choosey. I'm just glad we got her down there. Oliver said he was going to book Pops to drive Jana Lee out to the air-

port. Pops is our company limo driver. Won't Carly be surprised when her mother picks her up in a limo?"

Dean was unusually quiet. He was giving her a tour of the house. She followed him into his office. A large, amazing abstract painting dominated the study. A sleek credenza against one ochre wall had a collection of cat-sized sculpted pieces in dark bronze, but they weren't pussycats. They were beautiful, smooth nudes, like the ones in the garden.

"Wow. That's not who I think it is, is it?" She pointed to the large canvas.

"Kandinsky Believe it or not, it was done in 1913. That always amazes me."

"Incredible. And those?" She indicated the bronze collection.

"Those are mine. They're actually studies for larger pieces."

She examined one very closely, touching the sleek, curved casting. "Dean, you are very talented. You should give up all building-related jobs and do art full time."

"I did give up building. You brought me out of retirement, remember, Jillian? Come here."

He held out his open arms, and she walked right into them. For a moment, she forgot all about what they were talking about. Or
not
talking about.

"And I took you away from commissioned work to help me remodel a house?" she asked.

"Not really I didn't have anything going at the moment. Just ideas."

"When is the last time you did a show?"

"I finished a show two summers ago. I've done some big commissions since, and that has kept me busy."

"What do you do up here, all alone with your clay and melted metal?"

"I need lots of headspace. But I do have assistants that come and help when I have to cast a large piece. I use lost wax process for those, which is very weird and time consuming and involved." He smoothed her hair around her ear with his fingertips. Monty Python thumped his tail against them and circled like he wanted in on the action.

"Silly dog." Jillian looked up at Dean. "You are so much more than my handyman."

Dean laughed. "And you are so much more than the lady I thought hired me." He kissed her softly.

"When are you going to start a new project?" she asked.

"It's just about time for me to get back to work— after your project is done, of course," he answered. That vagueness in him returned. He looked past her.

"Can I see your studio?"

"Sure."

"Brrr, I'm chilled." She wasn't sure why, but the same feeling she'd had earlier crept over her.

Maybe she was coming down with something. She snuggled closer and laid her head on his chest. "Show me your studio, and then we can go out and sit in the sun. Or lay in the sun." She eyed him suggestively. "The mountains look like you could touch them from your back patio."

"I didn't turn the heat on and warm it up in here. Sorry." He flipped on a gas fireplace inserted flush in the wall. It was so smooth that she'd hardly noticed it, but there it was, surrounded with black granite with a stainless steel firebox. Extremely cool. Dean had amazing taste. Taste like hers. She imagined herself living up here on his mountaintop. It was so, so quiet. It was such a stark contrast to the city.

"You should see my apartment in San Francisco. You'd like it." She looked up at him and knew right away something was wrong.

"Jillian, I don't know how to make this transition. I don't know how to go from making love to you every chance I get to putting you on a plane and saying good-bye Friday. Going to the airport today, I could feel it."

No guy had ever been that honest with her in her entire life. "I don't know what to say, Dean, but I'm glad you want to talk about it. I-I feel the same way. As a matter of fact, nothing could make me happier than never going back to that job." She felt emotion break over her. She pulled

away from him and sat down in his office chair, a familiar position for her. She leaned her head into her hands.

"Do you mean that?" he asked.

"I say it, but I have no idea what I'd do with my life. I have never allowed myself to think past the next meeting, or the next trade show or the next season's line-up. I'm not kidding when I tell you that this past week has been the best time I've ever had. You even turned a project I was making stressful into an adventure."

"We've got something special here, Jillian. It's not perfect, but it would be a shame to let it slip through our fingers."

"We could see each other, I could fly up on weekends."

Dean leaned against the wall across from her looking so good. He'd changed in the days they'd been together. Something around his eyes had softened. Without his even saying anything, she knew the answer to what she'd said about weekends. Dean Wakefield deserved more than her weekends.

The ring of the phone punctuated the silence that hung between them. It was so close to Jillian that she jumped and grabbed the receiver. Monty barked.

"Jillian Tompkins," she said. She looked up at Dean and put her hand over her mouth. Oops, she'd just answered his phone, and she'd an-

swered it office style. He was amused, until he saw her face go white and heard her gasp.

He stepped nearer and handed her a pencil and paper—whatever it was, there'd be details. A hard fist of adrenaline punched his gut. This didn't look good.

She was nodding and saying yes, and scribbling things on the paper. When she hung up the phone she put her hand over her mouth, trying not to cry.

"My sister is in the hospital. They had an earthquake and parts of the ceiling hit her. She has a concussion and a broken arm." She didn't make it through the entire last phrase, but he understood. Dean gathered her up and let her sob against his chest.

"We'll fly down," he said. "I'll go with you."

"I can't tell you how much that would mean to me," she choked out. "I feel so, so bad, sending her down there. And Carly is at the hospital. They must all hate me. That was Oliver, he tracked me down from Carly's information—my cell phone must not have a signal up here. Carly thought of you, and they found your number. Oliver booked me on a late flight. I'll have him get you a ticket too."

"Fine, we'll settle up with that later."

She was sort of babbling, and he took her hand. "Let's go. Your cell will kick in as soon as we drop down a few miles. We'll pick up some clothes for

you and take Monty to a kennel. We have a whole

lot to do."

"Dean, we'll talk more about us. I'm so sorry." "Don't be sorry. I love you." He kissed her

softly, holding her close. "I love you too," she whispered back.

As Dean's truck came around the corner to the beach house, Jillian screamed as she clutched the dashboard rim. This just couldn't be happening. He cursed and swung the truck into park. Jillian could hardly get herself to open the car door. The air hung heavy with smoke.

Dean, on the other hand, got out like a shot and ran. He ran straight into the mess, with firemen still stomping around in their big boots, raking through piles of what was formerly the deck of Jana Lee's house.

She felt a huge wave of panic hit her. Oh, God, not
now,
she had to think. But all she could do was whisper,
"Thank you, God."
Thank you that Carly wasn't here, and that the dog was with them. Monty was whining something fierce. She took some deep breaths and calmed herself down enough to slide out of the car and leave the dog inside, despite his extreme protests.

She ran over to where Dean was talking to a guy in full gear. He had his visor pushed back on his head.

"Glad you showed up. We didn't know who to call. It's not as bad as it looks, the garage is intact, and we were all happy to see no one was in the house. The interior has severe smoke damage, but it was mostly the deck."

"What caused it?" Jillian asked. Dean came to hold her.

"You're not going to believe it, but it was lightning. There was a thunderstorm last night. With the heat lately and all, a kind of thermal inversion. It hit the tree with the old TV antennae mounted to it. The tree split, part of it hit the deck, and that was that. Considering the age of the house, well, it's been pretty dry this month. It could have been way worse, folks."

Dean turned to Jillian.

Jillian couldn't even speak. She'd burned up her sister's house. Her sister, who was lying in a hospital bed.

The fireman went on. "They're going to want to talk to you."

"Look," Dean said. "I know this is going to be hard to believe, but the owner of the house is actually in the hospital with a serious injury—in San Francisco. We were just coming here to get some things before we caught a ten o'clock flight."

"Man, when it rains, it pours. Well, come over to the truck with me and we'll take your information down. Insurance, and all that."

"Insurance? I have no idea." Jillian sounded hysterical.

Dean pulled her over to him. "We'll go look for it. I saw a metal box marked Important Papers in the garage."

"Look at all your pretty work, Dean, just up in smoke."

"Hey, it had a bad layout," he joked. "We'll start over." He gathered her into a hug. "Damn, this hasn't turned out to be the best of days, darlin'."

"I can't even think straight. I heard the thunder last night but didn't think anything of it."

"Let's go talk to the fire marshal. Jillian, we'll make it through. Just take one step at a time."

She'd cry, but somehow it wasn't even available to her. Her whole body felt numb. Her heart was beating like crazy. Dean held her and rubbed small circles of comforting touch into her back.

"Okay, let's do this," she said.

They spent a half hour talking with the officer, who said that, considering the circumstances, he'd let them fly to San Francisco and they could deal with the house later. He recommended a cleanup crew. Dean said he had his own, not to worry. The fireman seemed to know Dean, and that made things easier.

Jillian left her card with her office number. They'd saved portions of the house, which still had all its walls standing. Because of the neigh-

bor's call, the garage, with all of Jana Lee's belongings in it, was untouched.

All the family photos and books and things that Jana Lee would have truly suffered over were in there.

Her house, however, was a different matter.

"I feel so odd leaving this mess," Jillian said as they walked away from the fire marshal's car.